What do you think attracts international architects like Zaha Hadid and Peter Davidsons Lab Architects to China?
Architects are naturally interested in new countries and new cultures and places that are delirious and uncertain. They come to build. I don’t think these architects are passionate about China. If the movement looks to Russia, they’ll go to Russia. An architect’s primary concern is to build. And it’s so difficult to build. Easier to build here than elsewhere? Yes, but really it’s not easy anywhere. Look at [Rem] Koolhaus. He’s tried every possible way to get his building built [the new CCTV building, currently shelved] and Herzog & de Meuron’s [Olympic Stadium, halted for a time]. It’s just not easy. How do you get round these problems? We are developers. We are not bureaucrats. Our job is not to predicate what government tells us to do. Our job is to predict what market wants. I have to say that China is a consumer market. It is very healthy and very interested in new things and it’s very open. Why? Partly because we are so lacking in tradition, destroyed during the “Cultural Revoluti
